(meteorobs) Quadrantid results from Central Alberta

[Bruce McCurdy]

Despite less than ideal conditions I decided to make a run out to Beaver
Hills Dark Sky Preserve this morning, knowing that my northerly location in
western North America to be particularly advantageous for observing
Quadrantids in years like 2009, 2013, 2017 etc. when the peak occurs
somewhere around 13h UT.  At one point I commented to my voice recorder that
I wouldn't be surprised if I was the only active (reporting) observer at
that moment. 

 

I wound up with 1.5 hours Teff between 12:40 UT and 14:24. Rates were
reasonably decent with 50 total meteors seen, 45 of those Quadrantids, so
exactly one Quad every two minutes. Not bad at all in skies that had an
average naked eye limiting magnitude right around 5.0. 

 

11 of the Quads were in negative magnitudes, between -1 and -4, with a
further 7 QUA at magnitude 0. Overall they averaged a rather bright +1.0,
although many faint ones were surely lost in conditions that were
compromised by a waning gibbous moonlight shining through varying amounts of
cirrus cloud and reflecting off bright snow cover. I hid in the shadow of a
shack on site to keep my immediate surroundings as dark as possible while
avoiding blasts of moonlight altogether, although the price paid was
obstruction of about 10% of my sky by the shack. 

 

I saw three Quads of orange hue and two more that I noted as blue-green.
Only a handful had persistent trains, though one lasted about three seconds.


 

I looked NNE up near Kochab and Pherkad, so had difficulty monitoring more
southerly radiants. I was moderately confident in one Anthelion meteor, and
of the handful of sporadics I saw most came from the north anyway. 

 

I also monitored this shower on FM band 93.1, and got numerous hits over the
course of the night. A few of these were simultaneous to visual observers,
and a few others rambled on briefly in the aftermath of brighter meteors. 

 

Not an ideal year but definitely worth the trip for the last good shower of
the season. Next year the Quads will peak in daylight hours for us in North
America with the next good geometry for this shower to occur in 2016 and
2017.

 

My detailed IMO report can be found here: 

http://vmo.imo.net/imozhr/obsview/view.php?id=11716 

 

Happy New Year to my colleagues on the list. 

 

Bruce

*****

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.meteorobs.org/pipermail/meteorobs/attachments/20130103/feaa0ed5/attachment.html